Maitre Isaac Gardon, a noted preacher, looked kindly at the boy's
fair face, and said, 'Bless thee, young sir. As thou hast been
already a chosen instrument to save life, so mayest thou be ever
after a champion of the truth.'

'Monsieur le Baron,' interposed Jacques, 'it were best to look to
yourself. I already hear sounds upon the wind.'

'And you, good sir?' said the Baron.

'I will see to him,' said the farmer, grasping him as a sort of
property. 'M. le Baron had best keep up the beck. Out on the moor
there he may fly the hawk, and that will best divert suspicion.'

'Farewell, then,' said the Baron, wringing the minister's hand, and
adding, almost to himself, 'Alas! I am weary of these shifts!' and
weary indeed he seemed, for as the ground became so steep that the
beck danced noisily down its channel, he could not keep up the
needful speed, but paused, gasping for breath, with his hand on his
side. 'Beranger was off his pony in an instant, assuring Follet
that it ought to be proud to be ridden by his father, and exhaling
his own exultant feelings in caresses to the animal as it gallantly
breasted the hill. The little boy had never been so commended
before! He loved his father exceedingly; but the Baron, while ever
just towards him, was grave and strict to a degree that the ideas
even of the sixteenth century regarded as severe. Little Eustacie
with her lovely face, her irrepressible saucy grace and audacious
coaxing, was the only creature to whom he ever showed much
indulgence and tenderness, and even that seemed almost against his
will and conscience. His son was always under rule, often blamed,